On the flip side, if you'd like to help fund our little homestead, please take a peek at what we have available in our Mercari shop and on eBay.
After much thought, I have decided to sell off all of the rabbits. We only have four at this time, but I can no longer afford to feed them through the winter. They're currently eating grass and weeds from the yard. If they don't find new homes by fall, they'll go in the freezer and that would break my heart for a couple of the nicer ones. If anyone is looking for a good rabbit - I have two that would be good meat breeders and two that would be excellent pets. Asking $30 each for them. I also have a few spare geese available if anyone is interested. I believe they're Pilgrim but they may be crossed with Embden. They're nice birds, pretty quiet, excellent parents, used to free ranging for a bit every day. Good birds, the babies from this year are already full grown. Looking to sell one adult male and two young males. Asking $30 each. We are looking to downsize our house pets as well, so if you're looking for a house cat, please ask about what we have available! We have four or five that need to find new homes as I am forced to cut costs.
On the flip side, if you'd like to help fund our little homestead, please take a peek at what we have available in our Mercari shop and on eBay. It's been a rough week at the homestead. I'm worn down and struggling emotionally.
Some time on Friday, Simon (one of the new barn kittens) died unexpectedly. My vet assures me that cats do not typically die from upper respiratory issues and that the 20 days between bringing him home and his scheduled veterinary appointment should not have resulted in his passing away. Regardless, this means that Ave (his sister) can no longer stay in the barn. Without another cat for body heat in the cold winter, she won't survive. So Ave is now a house cat. She's been quarantined in my bedroom until she can go to the vet to get a clean bill of health. Today was vet appointment day. Ave tested negative for FIV and feline leukemia, she received her first distemper vaccine, and was dewormed. She was given antibiotics that she will get twice a day for ten days to make sure she doesn't have the same respiratory yuck her brother had. Aside from some sneezing, she doesn't have goopy discharge, so I think her immune system is better than her brother's was. Miss Arya (our Saint Bernard) went to the vet as well. She's been having issues with being lame in her front right leg. Over the last few weeks the swelling around the front of her chest and top of her leg has escalated quickly, from a baseball sized mass to a cabbage sized mass. Two days ago she started to have fluid retention down that leg as well. The nerves seemed dead, but the circulation was still working. She was clearly in pain the last few days though, whining and stretching her neck at odd angles away from her bad leg. I've been giving her aspirin to help her be more comfortable until the vet could see her. What I at first had potentially thought could be a dislocation quickly turned to something else. I had my suspicions but I didn't want it to be true. This morning, x-rays confirmed my fears. Miss Arya was officially diagnosed with advanced osteosarcoma - bone cancer. It had completely obliterated the bone between the shoulder blade and elbow. The veterinarian said he could give us a referral to another clinic to do biopsies, but with how advanced it was, and how quickly it's spread in the past two or three weeks, we knew it wouldn't help her. She's been having fewer and fewer good days, and she's clearly in pain. It was time. Today we made the absolutely heartbreaking decision to put our three year old Saint Bernard down. I am distraught with heartache tonight. I've lost two animals in the span of a week. I find solace in knowing that Ave is having the time of her life in the house, playing with toys, sleeping in the bed with me, and exploring her new warm environment. She will remain an indoor house cat now. We will try to find new barn cats in the spring. After years of various delays, today we fenced in part of the yard. The dogs can now safely run and play without worrying about them wandering off. I'm so excited for this! Toby has long been relegated to life on a tie out because his recall is virtually non-existant when he decides something else is more interesting. Now he can run and play and we can play fetch again! I'm sure he will enjoy the added freedom even more than we enjoy not having to stop him at the door to attach the cable. The barn kittens are as cute as ever. We finally settled on names for both of them. The darker female will be Ave (AH-vay), and the flame point male will be Simon. They both have an appointment in two weeks to get antibiotics for their respiratory yuck. Ave looks better, but Simon has a snotty nose. They will receive their rabies vaccinations at the same time, as long as they'll be at the vet clinic anyway. Miss Arya will also be heading to the vet in a couple weeks to recheck her leg. She started limping on it over the summer and over time got more and more lame. When I came back from my summer away, I brought her to the vet. She was diagnosed with both Lyme's disease and Ehrlichiosis (insert reminder here to use monthly flea and tick prevention for any pet that goes outdoors in the summer where ticks are present). She was given five days of pain meds, and a months worth of two other antibiotics - to be given one for two weeks and the other for the two weeks following. The pain meds saw her use her leg again, but when those were done, she got even worse. She now doesn't use the leg at all, her shoulder sags, and it looks like the muscle in her shoulder is completely gone. I worry that a follow up exam will see us facing an amputation. Big dogs don't do as well with three legs, especially front legs. She still manages to go up and down the stairs, she's just a lot slower. I worry that her joints will wear out much faster on three legs, and we'll have to deal with not only an expensive surgery, but ongoing issues with joint pain, arthritis, and mobility. We will see how things go. Perhaps I'm just pre-worrying too much.
I picked up two kittens today to be our new barn cats. They were supposed to both be males, but I didn't check them until we were in the car on the way home. We now have one boy and one girl - both of whom will be fixed as soon as possible. They're currently nine weeks old. I think I'll call the girl Ave (AH-vay). Not sure about the boy yet. They're in a big rabbit hutch in the barn with food and water, a litter box, and they have a blanket and straw in the house part. They have to go to the vet because they've got the sneezes and will need antibiotics. Welcome home kittens!
Today I got the first of the two large orders of seeds from Heritage Seed Market. I've already got all 65 varieties added to the Seed Stash page! They kindly sent along five additional varieties, of which four were new to the collection, so very cool! I'm excited to try some of these as many were on my wish list, and several are dwarf or micro-dwarf tomato varieties. The next order from there is the one with all the rest of the micro-dwarf varieties I went back for.
I ordered some stuff from Amazon recently and part of that order arrived today. I got a bunch of earring cards to put my earrings on so they look more presentable than just stuffing them in to little plastic bags. I'm hoping to sell them at a local flea market if we ever get back to being able to safely gather again. I also ordered a mannequin head so I could better photograph the hats I made and get them sold, but I ordered one with green eye shadow and natural looking lips, and they sent me a head with bright pink eye shadow and nearly fluorescent lips - it looks like Barbie, so I'm going to have to send it back. I also ordered a big pack of 1000 plant labels so I could set to work winter sowing. I figure 1000 will last me a while. I had two other packages coming from USPS that show "out for delivery" but they didn't make it. The teas I ordered on the 30th of December are supposed to be coming via FedEx but they've been in transit for ten days now and have finally made it to Minnesota, but no longer have an estimated delivery date. I'm hoping they'll show up tomorrow. Perhaps the couple missing USPS packages will arrive too. I moved the Aero Garden from the kitchen up to my bedroom just to clear space in the kitchen. I have it plugged in but not planted yet. I hope to put two micro-dwarf tomato varieties in and a few different lettuce plants. I can have salad while I wait for the tomato plants to grow. I've always used the system for basil but the basil tends to overwhelm everything else. Last time the basil was the only thing that came up! Crossing my fingers that I'll have better luck when I get around to setting it up this next go round. As much as I have enjoyed the abundance of basil produced by the Aero Garden, that's really all we've been able to grow in it thus far. I would love to get a hold of an aquaponics aquarium with built in lighting system. For a while a long time ago, #2 had one in his room, but the sunlight wasn't enough for the plants to thrive without putting the whole tank in the window which just grows algae in the tank. I wonder if I could find a similar aquaponics tank and set it up beside the Aero Garden if the lighting from the Aero Garden would be enough to get the plants to grow in the other system. I'm pretty sure that tank was in the old basement when it flooded, so we don't have it anymore. That's a shame; it was expensive. I love the idea of growing food indoors over winter when it's too cold to be gardening outside. With cats, having potted plants is a challenge. We have a few houseplants but they have to be very hardy to survive the cats - and me forgetting to water them on a regular basis. So far the pothos and the aloe vera seem to be surviving alright. The Wandering Jew plant I keep killing but managing to save one sad cutting to restart the plant again. It is not as resiliant when I forget to water it. Anyway - I suppose I should start considering my options for what to grow this year. It's already halfway through January, which means Winter Sowing season will soon be upon us! Goodness, we're just over a week into December already! This year is flying by. Or maybe I think that every December.
I've been working on writing a fanfic. So far I'm about 37 pages in. I think it's good, and I've read it to the kids and they are excited for each new chapter. I mostly write while they're in school so I don't have interruptions. Weekends are a bit of a slow time for productivity. I need to get updated photos of the rabbits and start actively trying to sell them off. It's something I've been putting off for too long. Procrastination is starting to cost me with ongoing feeding bills. The kid with rabbit allergies is starting to get stuffy with four in the house now. While Dexter didn't cause her any issues (and he lives in the kitchen), when the other three came in she started to have issues. They need to go. We're kind of liking having Dexter though. He's in a cage with an open top. The cats come and go and sometimes hang out with him. They all share a water dish (so the dogs don't slobber in it). Yesterday he was doing his happy bunny hops and dancing around, and then he'd stop and stand next to Mason (cat). Mason would reach out and put his foot on Dexter's head. Then he'd go hop and bounce again and come back to Mason. The kids lament that we didn't catch it on video to put on TikTok with the "you need to calm down - you're being too loud" audio (Taylor Swift). Our Christmas tree isn't up yet. Am I behind schedule? There's still time I suppose. I don't have any gifts to put under it anyway, so perhaps best not to put it up yet. The other day I was talking to the older girls about potential cosplay plans if we can afford to go to the Harry Potter convention next year (not likely, but it's fun to consider it anyway). I said I'd like to attempt to cosplay Remus Lupin, and wouldn't it be adorable if #5 could be a part of the cosplay. So I asked him if he'd like to participate. I said he could wear whatever clothes he likes, maybe we could dye his hair (temporary of course), and he'd need a "Hi! My name is..." sticker and we'd just write in Teddy Lupin. He was enthusiastic to participate but then he asked if he played Teddy, could be play a different character on another day? He's never asked to cosplay before, so I asked him who he wanted to cosplay as... So this week Tony and I were at the store looking for ideas for #5's birthday (he'll be six). He asked "what do you think he'd like?" and I just smiled, went straight to a certain toy isle, and said "No judgement - because I cosplay male characters... he wants to cosplay Owlet from PJ Masks." and they had a mask and top for dress up. Guess who's getting his first official cosplay for his birthday? He already has the Gecko costume from a couple Halloween's ago, but this will be his first requested cosplay outside of Halloween costumes. I hope he likes it as much as I think he will. Ditto went off to her new home today. The house seems quieter. The remaining kittens seem more subdued than usual. Are they sad she's gone? Or is it just that she instigated much of the running-through-the-house-at-full-speed play time and she's not here to start the stampede? I guess we'll wait to see if they perk up tomorrow. The hamsters will sleep without a watcher tonight. I'm wrapping up the big year-end seed swap for one of the Facebook groups I'm in. It's far too stressful, and I think this will be my last year participating. Every year they add more rules and more hassle to the process. It's getting to be a bit much. I really should have bowed out this year, but I'm going to stick with it and get it done to add some new varieties to the collection. After that I'm going to take a break. I'm stretching myself too thin and I'm stressing out more than I should. Between social things and kids and pets and seed swapping and my own brain being a bit of a butt (stay on task.... resist the urge to wander off.... resist... aaaand my mind has gone off track again....)... I just need a couple days to go nuts with crafting ideas, or watching educational videos, or doing something fun that doesn't involve cleaning the house, replying to emails, or fighting to get kids to clean their bedrooms or go to bed at night. It's time for some re-set time. Like, a few days of reset time. I plan to be a complete sloth most of this weekend. Yes, I'll have to suck it up and catch up on what falls apart while I'm down and out, but it'll be worth it to reset my sanity. We picked up a box of mini Pringles cans for the kids' after-school-snacks. I took one of them (after the chips had been eaten), and filled it with soil, then sprinkled some Tom Thumb lettuce seeds in. I put the lid back on and set it in a window sill. If sprouts come up, the lid will come off and hopefully I can grow my own salad for over winter. I do love fresh home grown salad. Yay for indoor gardening during the harsh Minnesota winter months! Yesterday I siphoned and refilled both the aquarium and the turtle tank. For those who don't know, that's quite a rare occurrence. I only clean out the fish tank maybe once a year, and I only siphon off the debris on top of the gravel. That tank has been up and running longer than I've been alive. It belonged to a relative who left it to me when they passed away. I am honored to keep it running. The tank is 100% natural. I vastly under-stock it, which means the two fish in the 30-gallon tank don't need frequent water changes. The long established beneficial bacteria in the thick gravel takes care of almost everything. Aside from topping off water lost to evaporation and cats drinking from it, and the occasional addition of live bacteria cultures, the tank is largely self sustaining. We have one female bristle-nose pleco who keeps the algae in check (as the tank is in a window), and we have one weather loach (technically a bottom feeder) who cruises around and entertains us. The turtle tank needed to be siphoned as the water was turning orange. I added a piece of driftwood we found down by the lake. I didn't bother to sanitize it because it wouldn't fit in my oven and the shape wouldn't allow for it to fit into a pot to be boiled. Inevitably it leaked tannin into the water. Totally normal, not a big surprise. It didn't seem to bother Minnow, but I want to make sure she had good clean water. It's still tinted yellow, but I'll give it some time to see if the driftwood leaks any more tannin before I change out more water. I ended up taking out eight gallons. She lives in a 55-gallon tank that was about 3/4 full. If I did my math right, an 8 gallon tank change was roughly 20% of the water. I also added more water (now the tank is nearly full) and pushed the driftwood down the rest of the way to fully submerge it. It had about 1-inch sticking up above the water before. It looks nice over all and I think once we add more goldfish for Minnow they'll have a nice natural area that will make a little more of a challenge for Minnow when hunting. Overall, not bad considering I was changing the water with a gallon jug by hand, walking back and forth across the length of the house. Yes, I accidentally created a blackwater aquarium for my turtle. Which wouldn't be so bad really - it does mimic an aquatic turtle's natural environment. This is why I am not overly worried about siphoning it again right away. So long as she seems happy, and she's still eating and basking, it's really more about the aesthetic of the tank. I've been exploring some creative outlets I want to try. The main one I'm really looking into right now is creating aquarium decor. We live on a lake and have beautiful trees all around us. There is ample access to driftwood (pieces weathered by water or by wind and rain on land). I've never worked with silicone before, but I'm still in the research phase of all of this. I've been out of the aquarium world since leaving the pet store job in 2013. I'm quickly getting back into the swing of things.
For example, did you know that plecos need wood in their diet to remain healthy? There should be driftwood in any aquarium that also houses a pleco. The pleco will pick at and clean off the drift wood, and in return will be healthier. Did you know that plecos and cichlids (and lots of other varieties of fish) love to have a cave or a tube to hide in or swim through? I knew this one but it had never occurred to me to actually build one myself. My first planned project will be a simple one meant to build my confidence and give me a simple start with using silicone in a caulking gun. I plan to make an above-water shelf for the fish tank to allow the cats to perch in a safe place to drink from the aquarium. I'm hoping to do this project within the next week, but it depends on if we have the extra money for the supplies or not. Once I've got that project done and I'm feeling a little more confident, I do plan to start trying my hand at a couple different caves and/or other hides with different materials. I have so many ideas! I want to incorporate all kinds of materials that have been suggested in numerous hobbyist videos and forums. I'm so excited. And if all goes well, maybe I'd even offer some of my creations for sale. Again, timeline on this depends on when we have some spare money to buy some supplies. I de-wormed every cat and kitten today (including the barn cats). Oddly enough, none of them seemed to mind. Little Hanzo purrs a lot. He loves to snuggle. Ditto has stopped beating him up and they cuddle and nap together on the couch. I just need to train Hanzo to use the scratching post and not the couch. He also hasn't figured out how to get to the hidden food bowl yet. It's in a cupboard to keep the dogs out of it. Today I just gave him a bowl and fed him on the couch while the dogs were out for a potty break. Tomorrow I'll put him in the cupboard and let him find his own way back out so he'll better remember where the food is normally. I separated Rhona from Snowflake and Lorna. I've been meaning to for quite some time, but just kept putting it off. I dug up the last of the potatoes today. Not bad considering these beds were not maintained at all. No weeding, no watering, no mounding, no added dirt. Just 2-5 seed potatoes dropped in the compost-amended soil and left all summer. The Purple Majesty variety had fewer potatoes over all because only one seed potato actually grew, but the potatoes were a lot larger than Red Thumb. There was a lot of creeping charlie in this bed, and almost no worms.
The Red Thumb potatoes were all over in the bed, but some of them are no bigger than the fingernail on my pinkie finger. I doubt they'll stay good for long. This bed was positively crawling with worms, some of them large (night crawlers?). In an additional experiment, I used tall grass I hand pulled from the yard and laid it over this bed to make a barrier. I want to see if doing this makes any difference when I go to plant next year. I can only imagine how much bigger this harvest could have been had I maintained the potato beds this year. It's amazing the difference location and soil amendments can make! Let me start out by saying, Amos is doing great! He's not fond of his eye medicine, but he's gotten a lot better at letting me put it in and even snuggles with me after getting medicated. He's such a trooper. Now I need to save up for the cost of the surgery he's going to need to pull his two retained kitten teeth and to (permanently) fix his eyes to prevent future infections. I did not ask the vet what the cost would be, but given the cost of other anesthesia procedures I've had to pay for in the past, my guess will be something in the $200-$300 range. If anyone wants to donate toward Amos's surgery, please let me know. I would be thrilled to get this done soon to get it out of the way, but my bank account can't support it right now. I attempted to update the kitten page, only to realize I didn't have any really good clear photos of the kittens on my phone. Time for an impromptu photo session in the screen porch! You can see their beautiful faces on the Kittens page, but to save you the click, here are their best photos. Luna's litter is five and a half weeks old now. I'm a little torn at this point. I want them to stay with Luna as long as possible for proper mental, emotional, and physical health. They live in the screen porch, which is not heated. The low temperatures are going to be in the 40's and the highs are quickly dropping from the 70's to the 60's, and possibly into the 50's in the near future. I had planned to bring Hanzo and Tracer in the house as soon as they were weaned. Tracer because she's slower than the other kittens (developmentally it would seem), and needs to be in a safer environment than outdoors. Hanzo because he hates dogs and needs to have some more time spent with them to get him over it. Ditto is doing a lot better with the dogs now than she did when she first came in the house, which gives me hope for Hanzo. But now I'm wondering if I should bring all of them indoors. This would defeat the entire purpose of having Mei as a barn cat so I didn't want to bring her in if I could help it... but I also don't want her to freeze to death.
I think part of the issue is that when we first got Gypsy and Luna, it was something like September and the vet told me that spring kittens make good barn cats, but fall kittens don't usually survive their first winter. We spent the whole first winter trying to find a balance between keeping the kittens outside and acclimated to the cold, but also bringing them into the porch where it was at least a bit warmer (which they hated). I lament that Mei was not born in the spring. As much as I adore her, it may just be that she will also need to find a home where she can live indoors and be pampered. My husband is not a fan of the idea of bringing six more kittens into the house (I have to agree with him). Our house is plenty full as it is, and with school right around the corner, kids will have less time to do chores, leaving more of it to me to keep up on. Do I want to scoop enough litter boxes every day to keep an additional six kittens in the house? No, I really don't. Will I? Yes, if it means they are safe. Someone please adopt some kitties! I'm still trying to figure out a price for these kittens. With Floki's kittens we just waited until they were six months old and took care of all of their vet work up front. Every kitten was vaccinated, dewormed, microchipped, and spayed/neutered before they left. I liked knowing that they were set for at least their first year when handing them off to their new families, but it's a lot of work (and expense) to care for kittens for six months. We lost our hats on expenses selling each kitten for $250 (and Ginger Bear is still looking for his forever home). I'd like to find Gypsy and Luna's kittens homes sooner than that, but not step back from the responsibility of having brought these extra animals into the world. So what is a fair price? An exam fee is around $20-$30, plus the cost of their PRC vaccine (need at least two). I don't have that cost off the top of my head, but I think it's around $20. That means if you start vaccinating at 8 weeks old, you've already sunk $80-$100 into two vaccination visits by 10 weeks old. At 12 weeks old, they're old enough for the $15 rabies vaccine (our vet does not charge an exam fee for a rabies vaccine). That brings us up to $95-$115 invested in medical care by 12 weeks old (per kitten). This doesn't include food, cat litter, the collar, cleaning supplies, or the time and energy put into socializing them. Add in the $64 our vet charges for microchipping, and we're at $159-$179 (each). If they don't find a home by six months old, add up another two months of food, litter, toys, and cleaning supplies, and tack on the $70 neuter or $130 spay cost. Now we're up to $229-$249 for a male, and $289-$309 for a female in vet bills alone. Once you add in the costs for food, litter, cleaning supplies, collars, toys, and incidentals... You can see how it's difficult to keep a reasonable price when costs are so high. I wish we had a low-cost spay/neuter program here where we could get kittens done before 5-6 months old. I'd make good use of it! Unfortunately, they're all over an hour drive away. Last night I noticed that Amos was more lethargic than normal. When I picked him up he was dehydrated. His eyes were crusty, and when I went to clean him up he shied away from me. Now, he's never much cared for me messing with his eyes (he was born without eyes, so he can't see my hands, and I think it weirds him out), but he lets me clean him up usually. He wouldn't let me pull the crusty bits off his eyes. I pinned him down and tried to clean up one eye, but as I pulled some of the brown crusty stuff back, I noticed his eye socket was full of yucky stuff.
This morning he seemed a lot better. He'd cleaned himself up a bit, he had drank some and wasn't dehydrated anymore, but he wouldn't let me anywhere near his head. He didn't even want me to pet his cheeks or chin and would wince and shy away as though he was in pain. I called the vet and made an emergency appointment for later in the morning. #4 and I walked to the vet with Amos in a carrier. I'm not sure what he thought of the trip. He was pretty quiet the whole time. When we got there he started purring. The vet took a good look at him, listened to his heart and lungs, checked his eyes, and his retained kitten teeth. She was going to prescribe the eye drops he had last time, but I told her we'd already tried them and they weren't helping. She gave us an ointment instead. Hopefully this will help him feel better soon. The vet did suggest possibly having the surgery I had wanted him to have originally. The one that would remove part of his inner eye and then sew the sockets shut to prevent future infections. That surgery does require general anesthesia though, so we plan to put him under one time and have both his eyes fixed and both of his retained baby teeth removed all in one go. It;ll be a rough time for him, but it will be better for him in the long run. Amos' mom (Zombie) had a dental disease that caused her gums to literally eat away her teeth. We were looking at needing to pull all of her teeth before she passed away suddenly and unexpectedly. I worry that Amos may have inherited this (as I believe that it can be genetic). This may just be the beginning of his dental adventures, but hopefully it will be the end of his eye troubles. I will have to call for a surgery appointment once his eye infection is under control. The good news is that he doesn't have a fever, so it's not a systemic infection yet! We caught it early! He should make a full recovery. Unfortunately, I had to dip into my emergency money to pay for this vet bill. I hate using my emergency money, but Amos needed to see the vet. If anyone is interested in buying a rabbit to help cut my costs and put a little money back in the emergency fund, I'd really appreciate it. The visit today was $45, and the surgery will no doubt be a lot more expensive. I'm looking for more stuff I can potentially sell to try to make some money back, but I'm kind of lost on what I can sell... I'm not so great with advertising so I end up not selling as much as I probably could if I was more skilled in getting my stuff out there. Anyone have tips on good places to advertise or better ways to get more relevant audience views? Yesterday I tried my luck on half meds. I only took pain medicine every 6 hours, and I did alright. Unfortunately, about 3am this morning I was in pain again and had to take more meds. I've had escalating pain all day today, particularly after doing barn chores - where I hauled a 40-pound bag of rabbit food across the yard, moved both the rabbit tractors to new grass, re-did the metal and wood roofing on the meat chicken tractor, and attempted to move the tractor (unsuccessfully). Lifting seems to be my nemesis. Back on every 3-hours pain meds I go.
I'm down to 13 meat chickens and they're all small and sickly looking. Despite following all of the guides and suggestions, giving free feed all day and no feed at night, fresh water all the time, glass and weeds to browse, protection from the rain and predators... they just keep dying! Not only that but we are now WAY past the nine weeks it was supposed to take to get them full grown and they're still only "game hen" size. I'm feeding them the meat maker high protein food they're supposed to have. What am I doing wrong? Why are they dying at such a steady rate and why aren't they growing properly? At this rate it's going to be a total loss if I wait for them to reach a good roasting size. Any tried and true advice from folks who've raised meat birds? I got a little more crochet time in on the pink blanket I've been working on lately. I should be able to finish it this weekend (I hope). I'll be excited to share a finished photo soon anyway! Today we did a little experiment with Luna's kittens. They'll be four weeks old tomorrow. Today I brought Toby (our youngest puppy) into the screen porch and let him meet the kittens. Then we let Arya (Saint Bernard pup) in. Then eventually Moose too (our adult dog). We discovered that three of the kittens don't care about dogs at all. Genji, Mercy, and Lucio don't seem to mind when the dogs come up and lick them or sniff at them. Tracer moves a little slowly yet and got stepped on by Arya a couple times, but didn't seem any worse for it. Mei isn't a fan of dogs, but will only hiss when they get in her face. If they walk by her she won't seek them out. Hanzo on the other hand... Hanzo actively hates the dogs and will follow them to hiss and swat at them even if they are not paying attention to him. We are already working on this. By the time we let the dogs out, #3 had Hanzo and Toby together in her lap without an issue. Yay for small victories! Rascal escaped his cage again. He learned how to pull his food bin into the cage and escape through the hole by watching Peanut in the cage beside him. I latched Peanut's food bin differently this time, with one side hooked one bar higher, keeping is ever-so-slightly off-balance, and he hasn't managed to pull it in yet. I really think Peanut needs a home where he can have a whole room (or better yet, an entire house or apartment) to run and play in. He doesn't seem happy locked in his cage, but he never really goes very far. He checks out the other bunnies, and jumps right back into his cage to see what we're doing when we put his food bin back in place. No chasing required. Rascal on the other hand doesn't go back as willingly and does need two people to catch him - one to distract and guide and the other to sneak up and pick him up. I noticed recently that Amos has retained both of his top canine kitten teeth, which are starting to look a little discolored and his breath smells a little off. I'm going to have to call the vet to see about having them removed. I'm considering bringing him to a different vet to get a second opinion on his eyes as long as he'll be sedated for the dental extraction. I love my regular vet, but they didn't even put their hands on him when they looked at his eyes. They pulled out a book, looked through the photos in the book and said "look like this one..." and called it good. Unfortunately, he continues to have yellow to brown discharge constantly, so I suspect he may need to have his sockets flushed out and his eyelids sewn shut to prevent future infection risk. The regular vet pretty much poo-poo'd me off for suggesting it. Today my husband told me that his boss offered him a new position. He would still be a manager, just in a different part of the store. He's not sure if he wants to accept or not. It sounds like he's going to sit down next week with his boss to discuss what the new position would mean as far as changes in scheduling, pay, bonuses, and responsibilities. I'm always leery of change, but we could certainly use the combination of a raise and fewer hours so he could be home more and still be able to pay the bills. It's nearly unheard of for a family as large as ours to be able to live on one income, much less a non-trade-professional type income (my husband is not a lawyer or a doctor). We've been extremely fortunate for the combination of my husband's constant promotion through the ranks from morning stock boy, and our frugal living (for the most part). I always say - rather than "how to earn extra income on the homestead" people should be learning "how to budget better" or "how to cut costs on the homestead." Finances go so much further when you don't have to pay for alcohol, tobacco products, make up, eating out, cable television, internet services, salon/spa/tanning trips, name-brand clothing, etc. I had a doctor appointment yesterday but it yielded no more insight than I had before. My tummy issue is clearly an intestinal issue, since diet helped keep it in check for a couple of years. This doctor wants me to try miralax and metamucil for a month, but did take five vials of blood for testing to see if anything comes up. I'm hoping they'll call me on Monday with the results from the tests. I'm not entirely sure what tests are being run, but if it gets me closer to a diagnosis, or rule more things out, let's go for it. Today I moved Gretchen's babies to the grow out cage with Wanda, Waldo, Hoshi, and Umeko. I named them Banana Split, Ebony, and Blanche. Tomorrow Hoshi, Umeko, Banana Split, and Ebony are going to meet someone to see which one is the lucky chosen one to go off to a new home. Then we have a birthday party to attend. I'm not sure if I will be able to deal with it. Being on my feet for more than a few minutes at a time causes me pretty intense tummy pains, and walking around the zoo for a couple of hours sounds like a recipe for disaster. Alas, #2 doesn't want to to go the zoo either, so maybe he and I will stay at Grandma's house while the others go to the zoo and we can prepare for when the party moved back to Grandma's house after the zoo. In the meantime, today I've been struggling with generally not feeling well, though I can't put my finger on it precisely. I just don't feel well. Yesterday I had a low grade fever at my appointment, despite being on doubled up acetaminophen and ibuprofen. I figure if I'm legitimately sick, perhaps the blood tests will turn something up. I'm on the last color of the crocheted rainbow blanket. Light purple. Then I will be done with it. Finally. I'm so excited to take a "finished" photo to share!
It's been a rough week. My tummy pains have increased to the point of being pretty much debilitating almost all the time. I sleep for a few hours at a time, but then wake up in pain. Take some medicine (ibuprofen or acetaminophen) and wait two hours for it to kick in, before passing out from the exhaustion of having been in that much pain. I did get outside today and I watered the bunnies and looked in on all the animals. I've been fortunate that #3 has been doing the barn chores for me while I've been down and out. Today Luna looked thinner. She's been quite round as of late and her babies have been active in there, so I knew right off that we had to figure out where she'd had them. It didn't take much looking. She delivered them in the same nest box Gypsy used for her kittens eight weeks ago. Gypsy has since moved her brood to the screen porch, though as of today they've figured out how to escape. Anyway, what a beautiful surprise! Luna had six kittens. There's one solid white female, one white male with a grey smudge (exactly what Luna looked like when we got her), one solid tabby and one tabby with white on the nose, chest, and toes (one's a boy and one's a girl but I don't remember which is which), one orange male, and one calico female. I've already decided we will be keeping the calico if she survives to adulthood. I've always wanted a calico barn cat, and this one is so pretty. She has a black face with orange over one eye and white over the other. Since the babies were born 7/20/19, they will be eight weeks old on September 14th. They sure are cute! Sometimes when I'm feeling crafty, I scour eBay for penny auctions with free shipping to get odds and ends craft stuff. Thursday I went through and bout up 113 such penny auctions with free shipping - all pendants. The idea being that we could put them all in a bag and draw one out randomly, then have a budget of $5-$10 each to go to the craft store and get the beads we need to make a necklace to fit the pendant. Fun, affordable craft that the kids and I can do together. Right? Who am I kidding? Nothing is that easy! I paid for 71 of the auctions, but the remaining 42 auctions the sellers (seven sellers for a total of 42 auction listings) went in after the auctions ended and adjusted the invoices to include a shipping charge. Several want $20 or more for postage! On an auction that clearly advertised free shipping and ended for a penny! So I emailed all seven of the remaining sellers. Maybe it's an accident or a glitch or something, right? So I kindly messaged each one saying I'd like to pay the however-many-cents I owe for the penny auctions, but their invoice is trying to charge postage when the listing was for free shipping. Only one seller got back to me saying it was an eBay glitch and they were working to get it fixed. I waited 24 hours - no updated invoices. I called eBay and got through to a call center in India (I do not have an issue with this, but there was a slight language barrier). I explained the situation, and the lady I first spoke to said she was going to make a note on my account that I wouldn't get dinged if these sellers report me for not paying. Then she transferred me to another customer service rep, this time a man. He seemed confused that this was an issue with seven sellers and not just one, and while he said he'd emailed each seller to tell them to adjust the invoices, once I got off the phone with him and re-checked my eBay messages, I had one in my box that he'd sent that was supposed to go to someone else... But he said to give it a couple days to get responses. As of tonight (two days after auctions ended) still no updated invoices. I am not paying $106+ for 42 penny auctions with free shipping, and I'll be damned if they ding my account for non-paying bidder complaints or try to ding my account by claiming I cancelled the orders. I will be emailing each seller again tomorrow with a link to eBay's own terms stating a seller cannot change the shipping after the auction. If I can't get corrected invoices by Monday I will be forced to call eBay again and get it straightened out. I have never had this issue before - and I've been on eBay for many years. It will be a shame if these seven sellers end up losing their accounts because of this. I did get a message on eBay from another seller with a nearly identical "it's an ebay glitch" message as the one from the other seller, but this time at the end it said "all of our listings charge postage." Maybe they do now - but they didn't when this auction ended. Que added stress to an already medically confused situation. I did give up and decide to go in to urgent care on Thursday, but I was told they were full up and had no more appointments for the rest of the day... Just my luck, Tony doesn't have a single day off this next week - in fact two days he will be out of state for a work convention. So my only option to make an appointment is next Friday afternoon when he gets off early and can bring me in. They had one space open - so I have to see a male doctor who has no specialty interest in internal medicine or chronic health issues. Wonderful. At least I'm on the calendar now though. That's something. Today while walking down the driveway (I went to check on the fruit trees), I noticed some interesting flowers in the yard. Does anyone know what these are? They're growing in a partly sunny partly shady area of the yard near some wildflowers and some planted flowers that have gone wild, so they could be wild or they could be something that was planted years ago and just re-seeded itself. I don't have any ideas. They're pretty and purple. On Thursday (goodness it was a bit of a busy day wasn't it?) we took in a new duck. The five ducklings we had out in the barn disappeared over the course of the first two days I was sick and didn't go outside. No idea where they went, but they're definitely not here anymore. My Ancona duckling was among them. And now we haven't seen Matt (our Rouen cross hen) in several days either. But I digress, the new duck... The lady we got Quackers from asked if I'd like a drake. Turns out the two males were fighting and she was worried about their safety. I don't really need another drake, but I figure we have enough hens here that he should be alright. We haven't named him yet. He had a bit of a stand-off with Psyduck when he first came out of the carrier, but Josh (the African gander) broke it up and the new guy quickly followed Quackers and joined her group. Now Quackers and Gracie and the new guy (all white Pekin ducks) and Phyllis (rouen hen) and Raisin (Black Swedish) are a little group. So far no more fighting. In other news, with all my time spent laying in bed (because seriously, standing up for more than a couple minutes sends me into hours of belly pain), I've continued working on the rainbow blanket crochet project. I've finished the blue/green and the light blue and am now working on the middle blue. Once I'm done with this color I just have two more to go (dark blue and purple). It's so pretty, but it's getting harder and harder to work with because it's so big. I'm going to be so excited to lay it out on the bed and take photos when it's all done!
I am still greatly struggling to be upright and functional. It's just past 10pm and I am finally sitting up in bed and able to type up this blog post. I managed to get out of bed and out to the barn long enough to snap some photos two days ago. It took me two days to get time between pain bouts to get those photos posted... but there are updated photos on the Rabbits page for Gretchen's litter and Princess Poppy's litter, and on the Breeding Rabbits page for Boyce. Below is a photo of Gypsy's kittens. Left is Carbon (the only boy), middle is Ditto (Carbon's near identical sister), and right is Tigerlily (she has a pretty coat pattern and white feet). This morning Carbon had a sore leg. He was fine my this evening. I wonder if he just got it caught in a bunny cage or maybe he got stepped on by a goose, or landed funny while playing in the barn. Either way, he's better now. Our middle child (#3) has a mild speech impediment and calls him Corbin instead of Carbon, so now I have inadvertently started calling him Corbin too, but his name is still officially Carbon Copy Cat. He is my favorite. He's playful and personable. Ditto is less playful, at least with people. She plays well with sister Tigerlily. Tigerlily is a sweet girl, very photogenic. Most of the photos I took of Ditto she was not pleased to be photographed and reminded me of a reluctant celebrity. Perhaps all that means is that Ditto will be a better barn cat and Tigerlily and Carbon will be better suited to life as a house pet. The kittens are seven weeks old now. In another week or so they should be ready to head off to new homes. I haven't advertised them yet, largely due to my other ongoing health problems. Yesterday I was in the bathroom, I took the mirror down and the cats were very interested. Here is a photo of Floki and her three remaining babies. Yuri (aqua collar) will be staying here. Blue Star (purple collar) is set to leave to her new home on Sunday. Ginger Bear (no collar) is still waiting for his permanent home. Floki (leopard print collar) is the momma and is staying here. We went to the vet on Tuesday and I have to say I'm disappointed. Blue Star and Ginger Bear got microchipped. I paid over $133 for this (why is it so expensive??). Then as soon as we got home both of the kids holding the cats handed me the microchips - they were in their fur and had not been implanted properly at all. We drove back to the vet and despite there being literally nobody there, they made me re-schedule for a Friday appointment to implant new microchips.
I used to microchip our own animals for the rescue I used to run. In all my years only once did we ever had a microchip not implant properly, and that's because the dog had particularly thin skin and the needle went in and back out again. In this case, neither cat had a puncture wound at all. They didn't even break the skin! Two mis-implanted chips at the same time? My husband wants me to call up the adopters of the other two kittens to ask them to have their cats scanned to see if their chips were properly implanted. I don't want to doubt their competency, but honestly, this is one more thing in an ever growing list of minor red flags over the years. I'm quickly losing faith in my regular vet and may soon seek care elsewhere. A shame really since we moved out here and are conveniently located near the clinic we have been using for several years. Back to the vet tomorrow I guess. The little dutch harlequin bunny from the colony died. The kids went to dig up the burrow since we hadn't seen any babies for a while and found it had died in there, all alone. So sad. I'm hoping tomorrow will be a better day and I will be able to go out and patch up the ground fence to prevent the rabbits from burrowing there again. We've been losing a lot of babies since they started burrowing again. The nest boxes we can check on regularly in the building seem to secure better survival rates. I also want to breed some more rabbits soon. I want to do a re-breed of Calliope to Mister Cellophane to see if we can get more of the pretty colors like Boyce. I need to rebreed Spotty because (no surprise) she didn't take... again. If she were my rabbit she'd be up for sale, but she's #4's rabbit and she doesn't want to part with her. I'm tempted to offer her a trade for a different breeder that will be more productive. I mean, wouldn't it be more fun to have a bunny that produces babies? Bacon once again failed to produce, so she will be officially up for sale just as soon as I can get an updated photo of her. If anyone wants an oversized chestnut lionhead doe that refuses to breed (may be spayed), please let me know! Today #3 came running in with this photo on her phone asking for an identification... Turns out it's an Eastern Hog-Nosed Snake. Thank you DNR for the handy snake identification manual! Turns out this one was out in the yard, likely hunting for toads (its favorite food), and #5 unknowingly got too close to it. #3 saw and pulled him back as it stood upright and flattened out like a cobra. Nobody got bit or stepped on. It was a great teaching moment to explain that he (or she) is just here to find food, and that he/she was rearing up as defense (don't step on me!). They went out again to observe the snake from further away. We got our guinea order today! Yay! Three dark brahma chicks and 15 assorted guineas. Two white, four are a pretty lavender color, and nine (presumably) normal colored ones. No DOAs! They all went straight into the barn brooder. I evicted the five large ducklings to make sure the tiny guineas don't get trampled. So far the ducklings are sticking together. This will be their first night out of the brooder. I hope they do alright. They are in the barn, but they're free-roaming in the barn - and so are the four big geese. I suppose better to learn their place in the pecking order now. Tonight Sapphire went off to her new home. It's a good thing too. I'm out of cage space and this opened up a place to move some of the bunnies around to make everyone fit better. Celery is back into his original cage and Egg is now going to live in the cage Sapphire just vacated. My biggest push now (aside from finding homes for the extra cats) is to get Peanut and Donna sold. They've been here waiting for homes for way longer than they aught to. They deserve good homes that will love them, or at least a farm home that can use them for breeding. Right now they're just sitting around. Anyone interested? Nice rabbits, they've got good potential. Just don't need them here.
I also need to find homes for the two remaining kittens (Ginger and Blue), their dad (Netherquartz), and Sage (the special needs sphynx kitty). And Gypsy's kittens will be ready to go in a few more weeks. They're currently leaving the nest area and exploring the barn near the nest. They haven't left the barn yet, but we still check every night when we lock the barn up to make sure all three are safely inside. I need to get updated photos. They're cute little boogers. They've been named Carbon (Carbon Copy Cat looks a lot like his momma), Ditto (she also looks like Gypsy), and Tigerlily (who has a gorgeous marbled pattern and white toes). I've got a handful of rabbits due to have babies around July 6 and July 7. I think it may be time to pair a few more up again. If I pair them up in the morning or the evening when it's a little cooler out maybe I'll have better odds of success. I'll have to consult my notes to see who should be paired to whom. Maybe I could aim for some Rex coated kits this round. The King Theodore Nasturtiums are blooming. Beautiful! |
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